Holman Guide to Interpreting the Bible: Your Journey Begins Here

By George H. Guthrie and David S. Dockery

David Dockery and George Guthrie set forth the basics of interpreting, applying, and communicating the Word of God in teaching and preaching. The heart of the book is a mentoring session with Dockery and Guthrie. It’s as if they are at the table with you showing you the steps to interpretation, applying it to Philippians 2:5-11. They have summarized the steps to interpretation in a chart that will be useful every time you prepare a lesson or sermon. And, you will find helpful workbook features for hands on experience

• Language: English
• Publisher: BH Publishing Group
• Release date: May 3, 2004
• ISBN: 9781433674778

George H. Guthrie

George H. Guthrie (PhD, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary) serves as Professor of New Testament at Regent College in Vancouver, Canada. He is the author of numerous articles and over a dozen books, including commentaries on Hebrews, James, 2 Corinthians, and A Short Guide to Reading the Bible Better.

Book preview

Interpretation

CHAPTER ONE

THE IMPORTANCE OF BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION

The story is told of a lady who went to catch a flight at the airport. She was in a hurry and had not had time to eat, so on the way to her gate she stopped at a newsstand to pick up a pack of cookies. When she arrived at the gate she found a seat, and in the seat next to her, just on the other side of a little table, sat an older gentleman. After a few minutes, and to her shock, the man picked up the pack of cookies from the table, opened it, and, with a smile, popped a cookie in his mouth. He placed the cookies back on the table and munched away happily. She was shocked and stunned for a moment! Nevertheless, not wanting to make a scene, the lady picked up the pack of cookies, took one out, and too began eating. She then placed the pack back on the table, thinking the man would not have the audacity to repeat his offense. Yet, he did. Again he took a cookie, looked at it thoughtfully, nibbled, and then gobbled the rest down. Now she was seething inside. How dare he help himself to her cookies! Still fuming, the lady took another cookie from its wrapper and popped it in her mouth. Now there was just one cookie left. To add insult to injury, the gentleman took the last cookie, broke it in half, slid one half to her, and ate the remaining half. Then, with a smile and a nod, the gentleman got up and left. Boy, was she mad! Thankfully, her flight number was called and passengers were asked to board. Mumbling to herself about the selfishness of some people, she got up and made her way to the gate. On the way to the gate the lady reached into her purse to get out her boarding pass and there found her pack of cookies!

How embarrassing! The lady traveler was so caught up in the hurry and hunger of the moment, she did not even know whose cookies were at stake! I am sure we all can identify with losing perspective in the rush and crush of life, and one of the areas that tends to get out of focus is our intake of God's Word. In Mark 4:18-19 Jesus interprets the seed that fell on thorny ground as the Word falling into a life that has lost an eternal perspective. The cares of life, the lure of wealth, and the desire for nice things, Jesus tells us, can choke the Word out of a person's life, just as weeds choke the life out of a would-be productive plant.

Others are sown among thorns; these are the ones who hear the word, but the worries of this age, the pleasure of wealth, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.—Mark 4:18-19, HCSB

You probably are interested in God's Word and in being used in God's work, or you would not have this book in your hands right now. Yet, you may be at a place in life where you need to regain perspective—to remember how important Bible study and the good work of interpretation are for a healthy Christian life and ministry. So, let's move our hearts away from those other cookies that tend to be so distracting—those weeds that crowd out our hunger for the Scriptures—and think in a fresh way about why Bible study, coupled with sound interpretation, is so important. There are three very important reasons, and they all revolve around why God created us in the first place. The reason why you exist has everything to do with why you should take biblical interpretation very seriously.

In my home are a wide variety of tools. My wife has tools in the kitchen, some very expensive, but most very simple and economical. For instance she has a mixer and a gas cooktop (examples of the expensive items), as well as an egg separator and a tea ball (examples of the inexpensive items). On my tools shelf you can find a screwdriver, a nail set, and a tape measure, for instance, and out in the shop you might stumble on my handy Makita circular saw. My tools also vary in price as well as their functions. When my wife reaches for a tool in the kitchen, or I seek out a tool for some project, there are two issues that are paramount at that moment: (1) the tool's availability and (2) the tool's ability to fulfill the purpose for which it was created. The most inexpensive tool is a most valuable tool when it functions as its creator intended to meet the need of the moment.

You may not feel very fancy as a Christian or very gifted as a minister. You may feel like a tool that has been misplaced or fashioned out of inferior materials. Yet, God purchased you with a great price (Rv 5:9; 14:4), and has very specific purposes for you in relation to himself, in your fulfillment as a person, and in your ministry to others. The key is your availability to him for the fulfilling of those purposes, and that availability has much to do with your intake of God's Word. Let's take a look at how hearing God's Word rightly interpreted has an impact on your relationship with God, your own joy in life, and your ministry to others.

TO KNOW GOD

God does not ask your ability or your inability. He asks only your availability.

Mary Kay Ash

First of all, you were created to know God in an intimate relationship. We see this throughout the Scriptures, beginning with creation, through the covenants that culminate with the cross, and all the way to the coming of Christ at the end of the age. We as human beings, in our first parents Adam and Eve, fell away from God. Abraham received the promise and covenant with God that established a special relationship with God and would issue forth in a nation to bless all nations. That nation, the Israelites, later agreed to and then rebelled against God's gracious offer of a covenant relationship at Sinai. Throughout the Old Testament, God constantly calls out for his people to hear, to call to him, to seek him, and to thirst for him. Relationship obviously is very important to God. Yet, nowhere can the importance of relationship be seen with greater clarity than in the promise of a new covenant (Jr 31:31-34) and in its fulfillment in Jesus' death and resurrection. God paid a great price to establish a new covenant relationship with us. That relationship will find its ultimate fulfillment when Christ takes us, as his bride, to the great wedding feast at the end of the age. It is all about relationship.

Listen! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and have dinner with him, and he with Me.—Jesus (Rv 3:20)

There are at least three ways the Scriptures, as rightly interpreted, have a profound effect on us fulfilling our purpose (that is, of God fulfilling it in us) of knowing God. First, God chose to communicate with human beings through human language. John Calvin wrote that God, in giving us the Scriptures, has accommodated himself to human language. This means that God chose human words, issued by real human beings, at real places in the world, at real times in history, to communicate with us as the human race. Receiving those words as God's messages to us, hearing accurately what God intended to communicate, forms the basis for how God speaks to us. In other words, if we do not hear God's Word accurately, we have no basis for relationship with God in the first place. General revelation, God's revelation of himself through nature and history, can form a backdrop, but we as humans hear God's voice give specific messages concerning his will and ways through his Word, the Bible, as it is rightly interpreted.

Just as old or bleary-eyed men and those with weak vision, if you thrust before them a most beautiful volume, even if they recognize it to be some sort of writing, yet can scarcely construe two words, but with the aid of spectacles will begin to read distinctly; so Scripture, gathering up the otherwise confused knowledge of God in our minds, having dispersed our dullness, clearly shows us the true God.

Reviews for Holman Guide to Interpreting the Bible

[raekwon-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Excellent little introduction to proper biblical interpretation methods and tools. I took a class from Dr. Guthrie (one of the authors) using this book as a guide and it changed the way I look at scripture. After going through this, I recommend getting a book that will take you deeper into the interpretive journey, such as Grasping God's Word.